Always Cocky
by pestilent.defiler
Summary: Solitude really is impossible sometimes. Mordecai breaks cover, Lilith is not amused. Sounds like the perfect beginning to a special friendship.


A/N: Obviously, I'm just a fan playing God on my favorite planet. Thank you Gearbox for the hours of entertainment Borderlands provides, especially with the unbeatable same system co-op and OMG elemental guns. Shooting regular bullets just isn't cool enough for me.

Fair warning: This is my first published fic and was not beta read. In addition, I have a highly developed sense of the ridiculous and am never one to pass up an opportunity for absurdity. I firmly believe in the concept of Mordecai as not only a total badass, but a fuzzy bunny at heart (Bloodwing in general, Moxxi's comment about his begging for her to run away with him...).

* * *

Mordecai stroked Bloodwing thoughtfully as the bird sat on his shoulder. They were high above the others, above the valley floor, perched comfortably against the tooth of one of the massive skulls that littered the landscape of Pandora's desert badlands.

It was quiet up here, a quiet he craved even though part of him was glad for the companionship of his fellow vault hunters. Sometimes the constant contact became too much and as the group settled for a rest in the unrelenting heat, Mordecai nearly fled to the nearby hills in pursuit of some solitude. A mumbled excuse about hunting with Bloodwing was all the explanation he offered.

Now, in the slightly cooler shade of the ancient beast's remains, he reveled in the fact that he could see everything for miles, with no one to distract him. He gazed with interest at the camp the other three had hastily set up, noting their activities. Brick was already asleep, head cradled almost childlike on one of his massive arms. Roland cleaned his favorite shotgun without needing to look at it, his soldier's eyes scanning the horizon for threats. Lilith was walking away. Roland must have asked the Siren where she was going, since the woman had thrown a look back at him and pointed in the direction she was walking without a pause.

"Cocky, " Mordecai observed to Bloodwing. "She's always so cocky".

Bloodwing clicked his beak in response, which seemed to satisfy his master.

"Where are you going, little girl?" the sniper mused in a low tone.

Before long, her destination was apparent. A deposit of fresh water bubbled up from the sandy terrain, good sized, and deep. A prime watering hole for the valley's monstrous denizens, no doubt. They had passed it not more than an hour earlier, shooting skags with abandon while speeding by on their racers. He watched with amusement as Lilith peeled the sweaty clothes from her grimy skin and waded into the sparkling water.

"Not bad, " he breathed, lifting the scope of his rifle to his goggled eye for a better view. "Looks like we're getting a show, boy".

The view was indeed a spectacular one. Now underwater to her waist, Lilith graced the empty surroundings with one of her rare smiles as she let cupped handfuls of water fall to her pale breasts where the liquid traced a delicious course down her exposed body. Her tattoos gleamed with an otherworldly light and she turned away to face the watering hole's deeper waters.

Though her shapely ass was underwater and considerably less visible, the display was no less compelling a sight. As Mordecai watched, he knew this would be a welcome memory to keep him company when he needed it most in rare private moments. His pants grew tighter at the thought, the erection he had been forming becoming more insistent. He paid it no mind. There would be time for that later.

Bloodwing shifted impatiently, a sure sign that the bird had spotted something of interest. His batlike wings rasped softly against his feathered body, and Mordecai glanced up at his friend to determine the direction he was looking in. Roughly the same one as his master had been.

"I know you're not looking at her, Blood, so what do you see?"

Erection and the cause temporarily forgotten, the hunter scanned over the general area, discovering a lone skag ambling toward the watering hole. He chuckled in anticipation of a different kind of show.

"Well, well. Looks like bath time is over."

He tracked both skag and woman, noticing the moment her magnificent shoulders stiffened as she realized something was near.

"Good reflexes," he murmured, "but who strikes first?"

Lilith turned slowly, spotting the skag an instant before it spotted her. She grinned her frightening, feral grin, the look that was often the last one a bandit would ever see. The creature lunged at her, gaping mouth wide. She met it with a deadly strike of her poison-laden hand, leaving it dazed. The time was enough for her to reach the water's edge and make a "come on" gesture at the animal.

Again it lunged, and again she deftly slapped it as though it were an overgrown fly. Clearly she was toying with it, enjoying the game. It would have been dead on the first impact of her hand if she'd wanted it to be.

"Cocky, little girl. You don't think anything can touch you, do you?"

The skag was obviously lagging, near death. It made feeble attempts to catch Lilith in its jaws, but she danced around it, nude body still glistening with water. Mordecai could almost hear her satisfied laughter in his mind. On a whim, he suddenly smirked. She thought she was untouchable and totally in control, did she? Time to wake her up.

"Get him, Blood."

The bird took off with a screech, rocketing towards the wounded animal. The hit was sudden and violent, spraying chunks of skag meat and a few undigested items everywhere. Lilith stood for a moment in shock, blood and meat gobbets raining down on her naked form. It wasn't until her sharp, golden eyes tracked Bloodwing on his leisurely flight back to his master that Mordecai realized that he hadn't fully considered the ramifications of his action.

With an explosion, Lilith disappeared. Moments later, a similar explosion rocked the brittle skull hard enough that small chips of fossilized bone shattered and fell. Mordecai's shield flickered and nearly depleted.

"You asshole!" Lilith raged, "You and your asshole kill stealing mutant vulture! I am so fucking sick of that damned bird getting in my way and-"

She paused mid-tirade and glared at him, eyes narrowing as realization dawned.

"You've been watching me?" her voice deepened with rage, "I finally get one fucking second on this hell spawned planet to myself, and you and that…that thing have been spying on me?"

Venom dripped slowly from her left hand as she walked slowly toward the still-seated hunter.

"Well, watching is kind of in my job description, lady." Mordecai sat with deceptive calm, wondering if his shield would have time to recharge.

"This rock is literally papered in porno mags and you have to get your jollies staring at me?"

Mordecai snorted. "You know as well as I do that Brick snaps them up like a kid in a candy store."

He rose slowly, hands outstretched in what he sincerely hoped was a placating gesture. Would humor help?

"I managed to snipe one from him the other day, but just my luck I've already seen it."

"That's lovely, Mordecai. Thank you so much for that. I'm so very glad you've had your entertainment without a thought for me."

He laughed. "You want me to share, huh?"

Lilith made a noise somewhere between an enraged scream and a growl. The caustic green goo seeping from her hand flowed faster as she lifted it towards him. Suddenly, she paused and seemed to consider the man. The venom disappeared from her outstretched palm.

"Maybe I do," she replied, hands on naked, blood spattered hips.

Now that he didn't seem to be in immediate fear for his life, Mordecai unthinkingly gazed with admiration at the woman's smooth, perfect curves and tuft of red pubic hair, trusting that his goggles would mask his observation.

"I uh, don't have it with me, but you can have it. I didn't know that was your thing."

"I see you looking at me, asshole. And that's not what I meant. You've seen me," she was directly in front of him in a flash, shoving the slender man painfully against a giant tooth, "now I want to see you."

"_Cocky,_" he thought. "_Does she expect me to fight? Or fall to my knees and beg for her to let me fuck her?_"

"Fine," the hunter said aloud, and shrugged. "I hope you like it, but you're a tough act to follow."

"Shut up," Lilith said, and crossed her arms over her chest. "I'm waiting."

Mordecai began the slow process of stripping, starting with his boots and various belts. He took his time, staring at Lilith all the while as if daring her to react, but making no effort to draw the process out or attempt to please her. Now his torso was bared, and he was in complete control.

Lilith let out an exaggerated sigh of impatience. "I don't have all day, skinny. Whip it out already, and don't think I haven't realized that I'm still not wearing any damn clothes."

In actuality, Mordecai had been putting considerable effort into ignoring that fact. His will was strong, but those breasts, those beautiful, caressable breasts…maybe he wasn't in as much control as he'd have liked, especially when she put one fisted hand on her hip, letting the other drop to her side.

"_I'm not a horny teenager halfway to needing new pants,_" he thought, "_I'm a grown man and who gives a damn if she sees I like looking at her? No surprise there._"

Still, he paused for a fraction of a second before beginning to undo his fly. A small breeze meandered through the skull, riffling Lilith's hair and causing her nipples to harden ever so slightly. She looked at him with amusement, almost seeming to read his mind.

"_Maybe you win this round, little girl, but you won't win the fight,_" he told himself silently.

Bloodwing made a soft noise, sensing the tension surrounding the two humans. Mordecai made a soothing noise in automatic response and glanced at the bird.

"Go eat, Blood. Nothing to worry about here."

"There might be if you don't stop procrastinating," Lilith muttered, watching the bird take flight and disappear.

While she was distracted with Bloodwing, Mordecai took the opportunity to shed his pants. With nothing in the way but his surprisingly brief underwear, the effect of Lilith on his anatomy was clear.

"Nice dick, so far," she smirked, "Now take off the mask."

He complied with a beleaguered sigh and untangled the garment from his dreadlocked hair. Blinking in the light that his goggles had so effectively lessened, he dropped it on top of his other clothing. He mockingly mimicked Lilith's stance, hand on hip.

Lilith struggled to keep her face from betraying her surprise. She had always assumed that the sniper would be ugly underneath the leather mask he wore, but found herself to be quite mistaken. He wasn't stunning, no. She'd seen plenty of men with more striking features, certainly. Even on Pandora. But the revealed mystery held an appeal for her that she couldn't quite explain, even to herself. She felt a sudden urge to wipe away the sweat that beaded on his exposed face.

His dark brown eyes regarded the siren warily. "_What is she thinking?_"

"I believe you're not quite done yet," she snapped, gesturing at his underwear.

_Of course_. He hooked his thumbs under the waistband and flicked downward with a flourish.

"Ta-dah," he proclaimed, and the effect would have been considerably more casual had the fabric not gotten caught by his penis on the way down.

"Ahem," he coughed, trying to regain some dignity as he freed member from cloth.

Lilith's hand flew to her mouth in an attempt to muffle the girlish and spontaneous giggle the sight prompted. She couldn't even be angry at him anymore; the whole situation was so ludicrous. She hadn't really been embarrassed by the man's peeping anyway, it was the invasion of assumed privacy that had angered her. He wasn't off the hook yet.

Mordecai's breath caught in his throat. A real smile again, two in one day. Not to mention the jiggling effect her laughter had on her chest. He found himself wishing that he'd made her laugh on purpose, rather than as part of this ridiculous game of revenge. Ignoring the throbbing from his nether regions was becoming more difficult.

Lilith's giggle passed as quickly as it had come upon her, and the smile was replaced by another smirk. "I see that you've been enjoying yourself. This isn't fair yet- not until I've had as much fun as you seem to be having."

Cocky. This woman was so cocky! "_I'll bring her to her knees,_" he thought.

"What do you have in mind?"

"Well, kissing is a good start, now that I've seen the view. A good kiss goes a long way. Think you can handle that?"

He smirked back at her. "That depends. Can you?"

Her challenging gaze was the only response. Mordecai crossed the gap between them in just a few steps and took her by the waist, one hand behind her neck as he inclined his head toward her lips. His intention was to kiss her thoroughly but roughly, show her that he was in charge of the situation.

Lilith breathed in the smell of him, intoxicating now that he was so close. Sweat, leather, and his own particular musky scent combined to form something that triggered an almost animal reaction in her.

"_How have I never noticed him like this before?"_

Without thinking, she reached around the man's neck to pull him close to her, almost overbalancing them both. Her soft lips met his slightly dry ones and a wave of delicious pleasure washed over her at the contact. Lilith's lips parted slightly, enough to entice him into the same. Her tongue darted into his mouth, meeting his, briefly wrestling for control and settling for the seductive dance that formed between them.

"_What's going on here?_" Mordecai's head swam dizzily. "_Forget it, she's not doing this to me. Maybe she always has it her way but not this time. Not with me_."

He broke the kiss abruptly, tracing her jawline and neck with feather light nips designed to make her press against him. It worked, and he smiled triumphantly against her tattooed neck.

"You like that?" he murmured into her ear. It was a phrase he uttered often, generally after shooting something in the face.

"Oh, I suppose," Lilith responded coolly, his words jarring her back to awareness of the situation at hand. "I_s he…is he _hunting_ me? Not going to happen, birdlover. This is my game."_

Lilith ground lightly against the man, running her fingertips from his neck to his shoulder and reaching the other hand around to squeeze his backside. Mordecai's lips compressed but his eyes revealed nothing to the Siren who gazed into them.

"I don't know, Mordecai," she stood on tiptoe to speak into his ear, rubbing against him slowly on the way up, "you still seem to be enjoying yourself a little more."

"Is that what you think?"

He kissed her again, this time with an intensity and need matching the surprise kiss she had bestowed upon him. It was better than the last time, but this was a dangerous game to play if he wanted to maintain the upper hand. He told himself to stop, but the feeling was exquisite. It had been so long since he'd been with a woman, and never one quite like the siren that was now melting against him. Mordecai had never realized it was even possible for Lilith to let her guard down so far. He moaned slightly when they paused for breath, an involuntary reaction he immediately regretted.

Lilith panted softly, every fiber of her being wanting nothing more than to lose herself in this man just once, rediscover a depth of sensuality she thought she'd lost among the death and carnage that had become her life. She looked again into his eyes and saw his lust and indecision. "_Is it really so wrong to give in?_" she wondered silently as the seconds ticked away between them. "_Do I have to be so strong all the time, can I not even admit how badly I want to be fucked right now?_"

The struggle between them had changed, Mordecai could sense it. Their eyes were locked to one another's, neither one willing to make the first move and admit that this had gone far past simple titillation and payback. She was so beautiful like this, for once appearing to him as a person, not just an untouchable siren or a fierce warrior with tits. Her need was as clear as her stubbornness, and he reached up to stroke her cheek almost without realizing it.

"Lil, I'm sorry for spying on you," he whispered suddenly, "can we be friends?"

She blinked at him, at first unsure of what she'd heard.

"I'd like that, " she said slowly, and closed her eyes for a moment. Opening them again, Lilith made her decision. She took his hand in hers and guided it to her breast, making a soft noise as his fingers brushed her nipple. "But only if you mean the kind with benefits."

* * *

Bloodwing circled overhead, hunger sated. The hot Pandoran sun beat down upon the valley and gleamed from the ancient skull where he'd left his master. With the piercing eyes of the predator he was, Bloodwing could see Master and the woman together engaged in an act he had witnessed before in other times and on other planets. If the bird had possessed the capability and intelligence to smile, he would have. It had been too long, and the master was always more forthcoming with extra treats after these performances. When he was happy.

* * *

Lilith was on the verge of coming completely undone. The pair had somehow managed to find a smooth part of the skull near what had once been the beast's throat before all thought had left them both and she was currently on her back, neck cradled in the hunter's arm as he thrust into her. That had struck her as strangely courteous at the time, but she wasn't thinking of that right now. She wasn't thinking of anything but Mordecai's cock inside her, and the vague feeling of flying in bright light ever closer to the promised land of what promised to be one hell of an orgasm.

Mordecai was doing his best. At first he'd tried to be all fancy and attentive to the niceties of foreplay, but as it turned out neither of them had possessed the patience for such things. Not now, anyway. Now was the time for instinct to take over, to do what they both wanted desperately to do. So they found themselves far back from where they'd started, in a smooth but nevertheless uncomfortably hard portion of fossilized skull. He'd managed to pillow Lilith's head with his arm, but then she'd arched into him, and he was inside her, and the feeling of her warm wetness was so welcome in the constant dryness of this damn planet…

All that remained was to keep going, to hold out on the edge of ecstasy, trying to think of something, anything to keep from losing control before the beauty underneath him had had her chance. "_Dust storms. Rakk droppings. Shitty loot after a hard battle. Brick and his damned magazines. Boots full of sand._"

Lilith shuddered and dug her fingernails deeply into the skin of his back. She tried to speak but it came out as an unintelligible garble of a moan. She met each of his thrusts, increasing the pace, becoming steadily more frantic in motion. Her partner mumbled something that sounded a bit like "skag jerky" but she completely forgot about it as the first wave of her orgasm hit.

Mordecai was losing the battle when Lilith suddenly clawed him and moaned. Involuntarily he began to fuck her harder and faster. "_Burning tires. Crazy Earl. Skag jerky._" That last might have slipped out of his mouth but he didn't care for long. Her muscles clenched around him almost painfully and pulsed against his cock as she cried out. He couldn't take it anymore. For a second he became even harder inside of her, and then the incredible release.

Lilith could feel him coming, the jerking and accompanying gush pushing her over the edge once more. Now it was over and they remained frozen in position for a moment, raggedly breathing almost in tandem. Lilith was the first to pull away. "_What the hell was that? What was I thinking? Now he'll never take me seriously and it'll be Callisto all over again. New planet, same shit, different day._"

Mordecai felt her tense a second before she wriggled away from him to lay on her back and stare at the roof of what had once been the mouth of a powerful beast. He wondered idly what was on the woman's mind and lay on his side to look at her with his head resting casually on his hand.

"So, I know it's hot out and all, but do friends cuddle after sex or what?" he teased, holding out his arm.

Lilith turned her head to gaze at him disdainfully, but the effect was marred by a ripple of what looked like fear washing over her delicate features for the merest of moments.

"_What's that all about?_" he wondered. The hunter smiled at her withering look. "_Cocky girl isn't quite so cocky anymore, is she?_"

"Don't look at me like that, asshole," Lilith snapped, and turned away to scramble unsteadily to her feet. "We got our rocks off, it was convenient, and now," she turned back to look down at the prone man, venom once again dripping from her hand, "I promise I will kill you in ways you can't even imagine if I ever hear you've told the other two about this."

"_Did her voice just actually quiver?_" Mordecai looked up at the woman in astonishment. "_That's it, isn't it? She's human like the rest of us after all. She puts on that tough front so no one messes with the untouchable badass._" Feeling empathy for people wasn't generally high on the To-Do list of most hardened mercenaries, but Mordecai was nothing if not adaptable.

"Lilith, please. Come here," he stood and gestured again with his arm.

"Why? What the hell do you want?" Lilith hated the defensiveness in her tone.

"It's okay to be a person sometimes, you know. The three of us respect you; you don't have anything to prove. If you don't want them to know, I don't care, that's your choice. But I meant what I said, I want to be friends."

Lilith was close to punching him and had actually raised a venom-laden hand to do so when Bloodwing drifted through the skull's jagged teeth to land carefully on his master's shoulder, fixing a fierce look on the human with the threatening posture.

"Hey, Blood!" Mordecai acted as if he hadn't seen the bird in days, unashamedly nuzzling the creature and reaching up to scratch his neck feathers. "Did you have a good dinner? Did you make anything explode?"

Bloodwing tilted his head back in appreciation of the scritches. Forgotten, Lilith looked at the pair, somewhere between disgusted and amused. Suddenly lonely, she headed for the mouth of the skull where she sat with legs dangling over the side and an arm around a tooth.

"Can I sit down?" Mordecai had followed her.

"Whatever."

"I'm only gonna say it one more time because this opening up bullshit is making me uncomfortable and I'm not exactly a people person."

The corners of Lilith's mouth turned up, but it wasn't quite a smile as she looked at the man seated next to her.

"You don't have to pretend to be anyone you aren't. You scare the shit out of me sometimes and whether or not you start acting like whoever the hell you really are, that isn't going to change. Now, would you like to go shoot something with Blood and me?"

"I don't know, do I get to finish killing anything?" she smiled at him for the first time since they'd known each other.

"Maybe. If you're fast enough."

"Asshole. Or we could just sit here for a while longer. I don't feel like getting my clothes just yet." She inched a little closer and put an arm around his waist when his draped companionably across her shoulder.

"You know, I probably owe you an apology, Mordecai. I've always thought you were a cocky asshole. I still think you're an asshole, but maybe not as cocky as I thought."

He squeezed her shoulder in response, silently thinking, "_ditto_" as the traveling companions turned friends looked out across the endless sand that stretched before them.


End file.
